The one frisking me, apparently looking for money, demands, “Where’s your wallet?”
“I don’t carry one,” I say truthfully.
He grabs my shoulder and pulls me away from the car. All four of them are now facing me. The two with rifles hold their weapons across their chests, not aiming them yet. The guns appear to be Hakims. No-Tooth, though, has a Smith & Wesson 38 Special revolver. Probably a black-market item.
“I think we’ll take your car, then,” the leader says. The other three laugh. “We need it to move some boxes.” They laugh some more. “There we were, sitting and waiting for some friends to bring us a truck to help us move our things, but I think your big car will do fine. May we borrow it?” More laughs.
“Where are you from, my friend?” No-Tooth asks. He twirls his revolver around his finger as if he were in a John Wayne Western. “We don’t see many Westerners who speak Arabic.”
“I’m Swiss,” I say. “I’m a police officer with Interpol. I suggest you let me be on my way.”
“Oh, you suggest that we let you be on your way?” the leader mocks me as he takes a step closer. “Listen, I suggest that you get down on your knees and pray because you’re about to kiss the earth goodbye.”
Come on, I think. Move just another step closer.
“You want me to get on my knees?” I ask.
“That’s what I said!”
I look at the ground and point. “Right here?”
That does the trick. He takes another step and starts to say, “Yes, right th—”
Before he finishes I kick him fast and hard in the crotch. I don’t stop there, though. I move in like lightning, using an advanced Krav Maga technique to grab hold of his upper body and pull him toward me as the toothless guy fires his gun. The leader takes the round in the back, and then I shove his body at No-Tooth with such force that they both fall to the ground.
Before the guys with rifles can react, I grab the barrel of one of the guns with my left hand, place my right hand beneath the butt, and use a levering jerk to yank it out of the surprised man’s hands. Before the second rifleman can level his gun and fire it, I swing the butt of my new rifle around and clobber him in the face. He screams, drops his weapon, and falls to his knees, clutching his head. The first rifleman, now weaponless, growls, ready to rush at me. I slam the rifle butt into his nose and then use my right foot to kick him in the chest. Stunned, he stumbles away from me but doesn’t go down. I then toss the rifle in the air, giving it a slight twirl so that it swings around like a baton. I catch it with the butt against me and the barrel pointing the way it’s supposed to. I squeeze the trigger and the guy takes the round at point-blank range. He falls in his tracks.
I swing the Hakim around to No-Tooth, but he’s no longer on the ground by the dead leader. I see him running into the dark thicket. I consider raising the rifle and taking him out, but I decide to let him go lick his wounds. I really can’t imagine where he’ll go in this rough terrain at night. The leader and one rifleman are dead. That leaves the guy whose face I smashed in. He’s still on his knees, moaning. I think I broke his cheekbone.
“You,” I say. “Stop whining and talk to me.”
The man looks at me, wide-eyed. He can’t believe I overpowered four men. The right side of his face is already swelling, giving him a lopsided appearance.
“Who are you?” I ask. “You’re not the police.”
The man babbles something in Arabic, and I raise the rifle butt, indicating I might strike him again.
He tells me his name and the names of the other three men. All generic Arabic names that seem to be interchangeable in the Middle East.
“Where did you get the police uniforms?”
He tells me that the police hired them to act as militia. That story doesn’t ring true to me.
“Where are you from?” I ask.
Again, the babbling. This time I play rough. I ram the rifle butt into his shoulder. He cries out and falls back. I stand over him and ask him again where he’s from.
“Iran,” he tells me. He and his three companions are from Iran.
“What are you doing in Iraq?”
The man rolls over and clutches the dirt. I sense what he’s about to do and shut my eyes just as he throws a fistful of dirt in my face. He jumps to his feet, but I’m ready for him. He grabs for the rifle and I jerk it up and forward. Even with my eyes closed, I manage to ram the side of the Hakim into his chin. I open my eyes and thrust the rifle butt into the man’s chest. He falls to the ground, unconscious. It’s possible I broke his sternum and maybe stopped his heart.
Shit. There are three dead men here. I have no choice but to abandon them. I don’t like leaving bodies in my wake, but it can’t be helped. I’m not going to waste time trying to hide the corpses, seeing that we’re so far from the highway. If and when they’re found, it will just have to be chalked up to the fact that Iraq is a very rough place.
I toss the Hakim to the ground and get in the car. I drive back to the highway and on into the city, wondering what became of No-Tooth.
10
I drive into Arbil shortly after midnight. The streets are deserted and the town is deadly quiet. There isn’t much in the way of street lighting so the place is very dark and foreboding. Carly at Third Echelon had transmitted a town map to my OPSAT, so I find the police station with no problem.
I park the Toyota a block away, strip my outer clothes to reveal my uniform, don the headset, grab my Five-seveN, put on the Osprey, and I’m ready to go. I get out of the car and creep along the street, keeping to the shadows. No one is around, but in my business you can’t be too careful.
The Arbil Police Headquarters is small. It’s a one-level building with a parking lot in back. I find it odd that there are no patrol cars there. The windows are covered with a thick screen mesh, so it’s impossible to see inside. However, I detect illumination behind the windows in front. Either someone left an office light on or someone is inside. I go around to the back and quietly try the steel door. Locked, of course. It’s a basic cylinder lock, so I use my picks. It takes me seventeen seconds to get it open. Not bad.
I look through the door and see a dark corridor. I position the goggles and switch on the night-vision mode. I scan the upper edges of the walls to make sure there are no cameras, and then I slip inside and shut the door behind me. With my back to one wall I slink to a door in the middle of the corridor and listen. Silence. I carefully open the door and look in the room. It’s an ordinary office—desk, filing cabinets, a couple of chairs. I move on and come to a T. To the left is a door marked Secure Area in script I recognize to be Kurdistan. I’m not too familiar with the language. Arabic I can get by with, but Kurdistan—forget it. I recognize some words, but that’s about it. If I have to speak with a Kurd while I’m here it might be difficult, although many Kurds speak Arabic as well.
The light I saw earlier is coming from the right. I inch along the wall and peer around the corner into a brightly lit space. It’s the front outer office. There’s a wall with a glass window that opens out to the reception area. On this side of the wall there’s a man reclining in a chair, his feet on the desk. He is snoring loudly. I switch off the night vision and raise my goggles to get a better look.
The man is wearing a police uniform, but it looks as if it’s two sizes too small. Something’s not right.
I move into the room and stand behind the man. He’s burly and has a Saddam Hussein-style mustache. I gently put my left hand over his mouth and pinch his nose. The policeman wakes, startled beyond belief. As soon as he leans forward, I grasp him in a “sleeper hold,” which closes off the carotid arteries until he’s unconscious. He falls forward and slides off the chair onto the floor. I figure he’ll be out for about ten minutes if I’m lucky.
I take a cursory look around the desk and find nothing of interest except for a key ring in the drawer. I take it and go back to the corridor. Sure enough, one of the keys works in the Secure Area door, which op
ens to another corridor. I listen for signs of occupation and check again for cameras. They only keep one guy on duty? Very strange. I suppose there’s not much crime in Arbil in the middle of the night.
I come to a locked door and try the key ring again. It opens on the third try. I’m conscious of my sharp intake of breath when I turn on the lights. It’s some kind of storeroom and it’s full of crates. One is open and sits on the floor three feet away from me. A pile of Hakim rifles overflows from the crate. I stoop to examine the weapons and see that they are clean and ready for use. I move to another crate, the lid of which has been previously pried open and replaced. I lift the lid and see more assault rifles—AK- 47s. Another crate contains Soviet Makarov PMs, 9mm handguns that date back to the 1950s. They’re also in excellent condition. Yet another crate is full of SVD Dragunovs, gas-operated sniper rifles.
There are sixteen crates in all, most of them still sealed. This must be the captured cache that Lambert told me about. What do the Arbil police plan to do with it? Aren’t they going to turn it over to the authorities, whoever they may be?
I have to figure out where the damn things came from. The first crate is unmarked, but the second one has an ink stamp on the side. In Arabic—Farsi, really—it reads Tabriz Container Company. Tabriz? That’s in Iran! I move to the next crate and it has the same marking. In fact, nine of the sixteen crates bear the Tabriz stamp.
Either the weapons came through Iran or the supplier is simply using crates that were manufactured there. At any rate, it’s a lead.
Against the far wall of the room is a stack of four large, flat cases. They resemble electric guitar cases only they’re much wider. I unsnap the clasps and open the top one.
Stingers. Four cases of Stingers, two in each case. Un-fucking-believable. These are American made. How the hell did they get them? Off to the side of the cases are two shoulder-launchers for the Stingers. These babies are terribly effective against low-level aircraft, such as helicopters, and a single man can fire one like a bazooka.
I make notes of the inventory on my OPSAT, take a few photographs, and leave the room. I move farther down the hall to a large steel door with bars in a window. The jail perhaps? I turn to the key ring again and unlock the door. It squeaks with rust and I wince. Hopefully no one is back there. I look inside and see a row of six barred cells. A small desk is to my left, but it is unmanned. There’s nothing here except a hammer lying on it. Upon closer examination of the tool, I discern a substance that appears to be dried blood and perhaps fleshy material and hair on the hammerhead. I turn to leave, but something in the first cell catches my eye. At first I think it’s a bundle of blankets, but I see now that there might be a figure lying on the cot. I turn on the lights and step closer to the cell. It is indeed a body, completely covered by a blanket. Is he dead?
I move to the next cell and there’s another guy, covered by a blanket. The third, fourth, and fifth cells contain the same. Number six is empty. I look on the ring and try the keys until I find one that opens cell number one. I pull the blanket back, and sure enough, there’s a guy with a bullet hole in his head. From what I can tell, he was shot in the back of the skull and the round exited through the front of his face. He is unrecognizable, of course. I pull the blanket back farther and see that the man is wearing only his underwear.
The man in the second cell received the same treatment, although it looks as if he was tortured before being killed. There are burn marks, probably from a cigarette, on his upper body. The third guy’s right hand is mangled, as if someone had pounded it a few times with a hammer. The hammer. The fourth man, like the first, was just shot.
I back out of the jail area and close the door behind me. I lock it again only because whoever had done this is sure to return. My friend in the outer lobby will be waking soon, and he probably knows a lot about what’s going on here. Perhaps he’s one of the killers.
I go back to the front of the building and see that the guard is still unconscious. He’s breathing steadily, so I’m sure he’ll recover with just a bad headache to remember me by. I make my way to the first corridor and head for the back door but decide to check out the office I saw upon entering. I open the door, step inside, and use my night vision to avoid turning on lights.
I have good reason to believe that this is the office of the chief of police. There are a couple of citations on the wall and a photo of the chief shaking hands with a man I figure is one of the Kurdish politicos. I look closely at the photo and I could swear that one of the dead guys in the jail cell is the chief. I’m not positive because the victims’ faces were bloody messes. Even so, if I had to bet on it, I’d say that the guy in the photo is the man in the second cell, the one who had been tortured before being executed.
On the desk are several manila folders full of mug shots. I open the top folder and am surprised to see none other than No-Tooth. In fact, the top four photographs in the pile are the same four men who tried to steal my car and leave me for dead outside of Arbil. Notes on the back of each photo are written in Kurdistan script, but I can make out the words terrorist, wanted, and Iran. On the back of No-Tooth’s photo is another word I recognize—Shadows with a big question mark beside it.
It’s all very clear to me. Those four bandits I encountered outside the city were here earlier. They killed the four real policemen and placed the corpses in the cells after stripping off and donning the uniforms. The bandits had wanted my Land Cruiser. To move the crates of weapons? One of them had said they were waiting for a truck to “move some boxes.” Are those guys the Shop’s customers? The Shop is selling arms to the Shadows? I have to say I’m not surprised. If the Shadows are the terrorist group du jour, then it makes sense that the Shop, the biggest illegal arms dealer in the world, would want them as customers.
I hear a car door slam outside. Shit. As keys rattle in the back door, I flatten against the wall of the office and hope whoever it is doesn’t come in here.
Two voices. One man is laughing and speaking rapidly—in Arabic. I catch the words “police,” “taking care of,” and “move the boxes.” The men walk past the office and continue to the outer lobby. I hear exclamations of surprise and concern when they find my friend on the floor. There’s a groan and a slap and another groan. The guard is coming around. One of the men orders the other one to check on the weapons, and I hear him ask for the keys. More talk, the sound of moving things on the desk, and an angry shout. The keys are gone, of course. They’re in my pocket.
The angry guy sounds familiar. I figure it’s probably in my best interest to get a look at him. I reach into the Osprey and pull out a handy tool I call the “corner periscope.” It’s really a lot like a dentist’s tool—it’s a thin piece of metal with a small round mirror at the end. The metal is bendable so I can adapt it to just about any kind of space. It’s best for looking around corners when you don’t want to be noticed.
I quietly creep out of the office and snake down the hall with my back to the wall. When I reach the corner by the front office, I stick the mirror out and position it so I can see.
The guard is sitting in the chair, rubbing the back of his head. The angry guy is sitting on the desk in front of him, his back to me. The other man is behind the chair and looks concerned. He doesn’t look familiar. Both of the new men are wearing police uniforms. I want the angry guy to turn around so I can see his face.
“What are you going to tell Ahmed?” the second man asks. I can now follow the conversation pretty well.
“I’ll worry about that later,” answers the angry guy. “It’s more about what Ahmed will tell Tarighian!” He grabs the guard by the chin. “You sure you didn’t see who did this to you?” The guard shakes his head. “Allah help me. Tarighian will be most displeased. We’d better find a way to break down that door. If our stuff is gone . . .”
Tarighian? Who the hell is Tarighian?
The angry guy turns slightly and I see his face. It’s my old buddy No-Tooth, the one that got away. I kne
w I’d heard his voice before.
I could take them out if I wanted, but that’s not my directive. I move away, down the hall and toward the back door. There’s a garbage can beside the door, so I quietly lay the key ring inside. No need to make it easy for them. I’m sure the proper authorities will have the means to break down the doors if they have to.
I slip outside and run to the shadows on the opposite end of the parking lot. I crouch and then move quickly to the street, satisfied I’m not being followed. I run in the darkness to the Toyota, get inside, and crouch low in the seat just in case the goons come out and start to look around.
Using my OPSAT, I send a message to Colonel Petlow in Baghdad. I explain that the Arbil policemen were murdered by Shadows terrorists who are attempting to remove a shipment of illegal arms from the station. I blind-copy the report to Lambert in Washington and wait.
Approximately thirty-five minutes later I hear sirens. I’m surprised by the rapid response. I was afraid the terrorists would get away with the goods by the time the Iraqis or the U.S. Army arrived. I see three police vehicles pull up in front of the station, followed by a U.S. Army jeep with four soldiers inside. I’d like to give them a hand, but I need to stay innocuous. So I sit back with an intention to watch and enjoy the fireworks.
But to my horror the terrorists suddenly appear from behind the building, firing AK-47s at the policemen. Three Iraqi police fall to the ground and the others jump behind cover. I recognize No-Tooth as the terrorist ring-leader. He throws something into the midst of the vehicles, and a few seconds later it explodes with a powerful blast. The grenade destroys the U.S. Army jeep and most likely kills or seriously wounds the four American soldiers. I now seriously consider joining the fight, but before I can make a move a van pulls around from the back of the building. The terrorists jump inside and the van speeds away with a screech.